4/14/12

Teen Titans Unlimited - bonus post

In what is swiftly turning into a cycle of recursive appreciation, the Titans Confessions tumblr has linked right back to The Eighth Day to showcase the original, unadorned "Teen Titans Unlimited" image and note my link back to their original post, thereby sending even more hits my way and obliging me to make a thank-you post in return. Said relinking was requested by poisonousstrawberries, who also gets major thanks. (She has a very funny gif as her profile picture right above a quote from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, so you know she was already awesome regardless...)
So, let's get this thing going and give y'all behind the scenes facts and bonus material from this modern-day masterpiece!

1. Notice anything unusual about the background? Look harder.

It's a hidden image of the Titans' iconic T symbol.

2. My original idea was to have the Titans appear at the largest resolutions I could find. When noticeable disparities in sizes cropped up, my initial solution was to create a distortion of perspective, with the figures appearing larger the closer they were to the center. (When I decided to more closely mimic the JLU shot for the final picture, I still retained this effect to a much lesser degree, even though I probably shouldn't have.)

The final version of this half-finished WIP would have been x4 larger.

Notice also the different background--part of the show's opening title screens, which would have been obscured in the same manner as the T--as well as an alternate Wonder Girl pose on the far left.

3. Some Titans were harder to find than others. Herald, Timmy Tantrum and Teether were all in fact taken from screenshots from the show itself (Teether being a composite of two different shots).

4. For two other Titans, Melvin and Kole, I discovered uncolored character line art, which I colored cursorily from screenshots before shading them like the others.

5. Gnarrk, meanwhile, is taken from a promotional drawing by Glen Murakami.

6. One Titan I could find absolutely no good full-body shots of was Killowat. This can be excused by saying that in the continuity established by the comic book spinoff he was returned to his native alternate reality (Teen Titans Go! #48).

7. Speaking of the comics, three of the Titans pictured made their debuts there: Geo-Force, Ravager, and Cassie Sandsmark (a.k.a. Wonder Girl II), all of whom are taken from Todd Nauck's DeviantArt.

8. And speaking of Wonder Girl, the original--Donna Troy--made a couple of cameos on the actual show but no more than that due to legal issues. She made her "proper" TT debut in Teen Titans Go! #36, and her (flipped) figure here is taken from a special limited run team shot by Nauck.

9. Personal kvetch: there is absolutely no official imagery of Cyborg drawn standing from the front.